The Show - An Online OOTP Baseball Simulation League

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The Amazins are 19 and 7 in July and their comeback is a credible one. Their new GM was brought into a team in shambles. The Mets had lost an unbelievable 116 games last year and had a losing attitude. Their magic of ’86 was long gone and the team was stagnant. When Smaller came in, he assessed the team seeing that their pitching rested solely on the arm of Ryan Wagner, their ace. Smaller knew he had to build on Wagner, so the first thing he did was sign Wagner to an extension.

With that in place, Smaller picked Hector Herrera with the first overall pick in the draft. Herrera is an 18 year old rightly out of New Orleans. He throws 4 pitches and the coaches and scouts thought he was ready to start at AAA. On July 21st he threw a 2 hitter and is developing faster than many thought.

Smaller’s next move was to find more pitching. He signed over 8 pitchers in spring training. Three remain of that bunch as many did not live up to expectations. At the end of April, the Mets were 10 and 14. Wagner was pitching poorly with little belief that things would change around. Jerome Williams, who Smaller signed in Spring Training, turned out to be a bust and David Wright and Brandon Moss were in love with the DL. A pleasant surprise was the pitching of Daniel McCutchen who slid into the closer’s role and has 28 saves and has only blown one.

One area that seemed to be consistent for the Mets was a young outfield and the consistent play of Julio Sojo. The 33 year old Sojo is hitting.366 and has an on base percentage of .408. He has stolen 42 bases and is a dangerous threat at the top of the lineup.

At the end of June, the Mets were 36 and 44. Smaller developed a risky game plan which was to trade for some quality starting pitching. He traded a coveted prospect in Emeel Salem along with closer Jeff Bibby to the Phillies in exchange for 31 year old Juan Morillo. When asked why he took such a risk, Smaller responded “Morillo is still young and is on his way to winning 18 again this year. I can always find an outfielder but starting pitching is rare.” Sensing it wasn’t enough, Smaller went out and acquired the veteran starting pitcher Justin Jones who was 11 and 3 for the D-Backs. “I felt like Jones could take us to a playoff berth”.

The Mets are back to .500 sitting 4 back of the Phillies and will play them 6 times starting tonight in Veterans Stadium.